Capozzi

Apparently there’s a collection of videos related to Mark, Good Horsey and Capozzi Park on YouTube. A treasure.

Today I played this one.

I have often wondered why the name Capozzi Park.

There was a toy shop in Bari whose name was Capozzi. For the little Luigi, that place had the characteristics of heaven or at least it was like a party. Every time my aunt or my parents took me there, I came back home with a new toy. The shop sadly closed its doors a few years ago and today I can’t even tell you what’s in its place.

It is not possible for me to separate the two things, Mark and that shop.

Capozzi is also the last name of a coiffeur where both my aunt and my mother went every Thursday when I was a kid. I often went with them, to have a cut, read one of the many gossip magazines, avoid homeworks and because at some point I think I secretly fell in love with the girl who washed hair. I was just a kid, 7 or 8 years old, pure innocent love.

Capozzi is also the name of a dairy shop in Casamassima, the small town where I live these days. They prepare some scamorza stuffed with speck to which I just can’t say now.

This Capozzi to which a park has been dedicated somewhere in Canada must originate from Bari.

On the other hand, in almost every family here but not in mine, there is a relative, a cousin, an uncle who at some point emigrated to America and that every time he came home he brought cigarettes, chocolate, pepper, cinnamon chewing gums, all the typical things you would expect to receive from a visiting relative.

I have a bunch of copies of “Mark, et al” available for purchase.

Grab yours now.